OS X Yosemite and new Macs rumoured to launch late October

Apple's next desktop operating system, OS X Yosemite, will launch in late October alongside two new Macs, according to fresh reports.

The company has already revealed that it will launch an unprecedented public beta program for the spangly operating system starting from today. The first million subscribers will gain access to a pre-release build of Yosemite.

Now 9to5Mac is claiming to have heard from several sources when the final software will ship. It claims that OS X Yosemite will trail iOS 8 - with which it will share a strong link - by a month, hitting the App Store as a free download towards the end of October.

Apple is said to be working to a pretty strict time-table, with a number of OS X Yosemite Developer Preview updates planned every two to three weeks, and the final Developer Preview pencilled in for September 29.

Then, according to the report, Apple will the golden master version of OS X Yosemite - the version that will be send out to consumers - around October 10.

Interestingly, the same sources that provided this information claim that Apple will launch a couple of new Mac lines to accompany the Yosemite launch. These will include a smaller MacBook with a 12-inch high-resolution display, which may not necessarily be the much-rumoured MacBook Air with Retina display.

The report claims that this could be a new compact MacBook Pro, or even a completely new MacBook line.

Then there's the promise of a new 4K desktop option, though it's unclear whether this will be a new high definition iMac or a desktop monitor.